NIST chemist Carolyn Burdette is surprised by the viral social media response to a photo of peanut butter SRM 2387, a product NIST sells among other “foods” like spinach and low-calorie cranberry juice cocktail. NIST develops standard reference materials (SRMs) to help food manufacturers calibrate their tests and equipment for accurate nutritional labeling. Buying an […]
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In 2022, the author proposed using Zopfli to compress npm packages by 5%, improving performance and reducing storage costs. Despite rejection, the author conducted proof of concept tests on their own packages, achieving a 6.2% size reduction. They then considered applying this approach to the entire npm registry, but faced challenges related to decompression time […]
ErisForge is a Python library that allows you to modify Large Language Models (LLMs) by adjusting their internal layers, creating altered behaviors. Named after Eris, the goddess of strife, the library offers the ability to ablate or enhance model responses in a controlled manner. Users can measure refusal expressions in model responses and customize behavior […]
The author created a podcast player for iOS called Podcatcher, using a combination of Racket and Swift. The app includes audio enhancements like an equalizer and silence trimming, and is free from ads and tracking. It lacks cross-device sync via iCloud and has a simple UI. Future updates may include a sleep timer, support for […]
The author of this web content discusses the complexities and potential pitfalls of bilinear upsampling and downsampling in image processing. They highlight the lack of consensus on the terminology and methodology in the field, leading to confusion and bugs in popular libraries like Tensorflow. The post delves into the nuances of different approaches to bilinear […]
Douglas Bader, a Battle of Britain pilot, overcame the loss of his legs to become a remarkable flyer and persistent escapee once captured by the Germans. Known for his advocacy of the controversial ‘Big Wing’ formation, he led successful missions during the war. Bader’s luck ran out in 1941 when his plane was damaged, leading […]
Venezuela’s presidential election was marred by government censorship, with over 70 media outlets and NGO sites, as well as Wikipedia, blocked to interfere with the vote. Despite the blocks, Proton VPN saw a 4,000% spike in downloads as Venezuelans sought to bypass the restrictions. Proton’s CEO engaged in a “cat and mouse game” with censors, […]
The ongoing tuberculosis outbreak in Kansas has reached historic levels, with the largest outbreak ever recorded in U.S. history. Public health officials have documented 66 active cases and 79 latent infections in the Kansas City area since 2024, mostly in Wyandotte County. State officials are working collaboratively with the CDC to address the outbreak and […]
Tech Report introduces the Qwen2.5-1M series models and inference framework support, unleashing two new opensource models capable of handling 1M-token contexts. Notably, the Qwen Chat advanced AI assistant offers diverse functionalities and supports long-context processing. Performance evaluations show the Qwen2.5-1M models excel in long-context tasks, outperforming their 128K counterparts. Key techniques involve long-context training with […]
Shunpo is a minimalist bash tool designed to help you navigate directories in the terminal more efficiently. With a simple system for managing bookmarks and quick shortcuts for jumping to directories, Shunpo is perfect for those who frequently use cd, pushd, or popd commands. The tool requires Bash 3.2 or newer and can be easily […]